Jessica Lange To Leave "American Horror Story"

Jessica Lange says that she's not far off from retirement and so is carefully deciding about what to do with her next few years. She tells The Los Angeles Times:

"I am coming to the end of acting. I have a list: another stage production, maybe one or two more movies, one more season of 'American Horror Story'... and then that is it for me. Because I think that's enough. I want to go out with a bang ... or should I say, a scare?"

That would mean she would bow out of 'Horror' at the end of the fourth season. Lange says her role on the show has proven something of a career renaissance for her:

"It reenergized me; it reenergized my career. There's no shame in recognizing that. It's exposed me to a whole new generation, which is a little strange. I'm not used to young people thinking I'm cool.

It brought back the thrill of acting. It was the perfect storm. It's all the tired stuff everybody says — age working against you, films that made your career not being made anymore.

But also, I really needed a distraction in my life; I was still getting used to the idea of my kids leaving the nest. I thought it was a good time to go out on a limb because horror is not my thing."

The show's network FX likely won't want her to leave. 'Coven,' the currently airing third season of the anthology series, has proven a massive success for the network and the first two episodes are the most watched FX telecasts of all time behind only the most recent season premiere of "Sons of Anarchy".

Said episodes of 'Coven' pulled in 7.2 million viewers each in Live+3 ratings, 4.95 million each from the key 18-49 demo. Ratings for this season have jumped 41% from the second season and are up 90% from the first season.